Photos of the Week - Week 3

Critique Group Challenge: 

Week 3, Backside

Photo by Mary Degreef

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Mary says:

I decided to go with what I had the most to choose from. Bovine Backsides. I like this big fellows attitude and his total lack of inhibition about his body. He was a pleasure to work with. I used a texture from my collection so the metadata may show that instead of the bull but the bullshot is fresh from today.

52-Week Photo Challenge Class
Week 3 - Find A Line

Week 52 Photo Challenge:

Week 3, Find A Line

Photo by David Scharf

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David says:

The gap between the hood and fender on my wife's minivan (she needs one for those quilt retreats, you know). This is a color photo, it's just a grey van shot in a somewhat dim garage. I upped the clarity a bit, otherwise unedited.

Smart Phone Photo Challenges
Week 3 - Hot Stuff

Smart Phone Challenge:

Week 3, Hot Stuff

Photo by Linda Rowberry

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Linda says:

A bin of Jalapeño peppers is hot stuff to me!

Smart Phone Challenge:

Week 3, Hot Stuff

Photo by Ricky Tims

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Ricky says:

I chose to spare you all from a selfie (haha) and decided a winter’s snowy day needs hot chocolate. I was not pleased with the “stream” because there is minimal humidity here. I created the filter effect first with Prisma. The steam was added in MotionLeap.

Critique Group Challenge:

Week 3, Backside

Photo by Ricky Tims
from the 2021 Critique Group

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Ricky says:

This is the backside of a wonderful violin. The wood has this amazing stripe. I left it in the case for the blue and was pleased that the refelctions were also blue. Only basic edits and several tiny speck/spot removals.

Almost immediately after posting this, I thought of my best backside option. The story and photos are here: https://rickytims.smugmug.com/2022-PhotoExtras/

Arabian Nights by Ricky Tims

Arabian Night is a beautiful stitched raw-edge appliqué quilt that features a center medallion. Many of you know Accuquilt and their dies. The primary shapes are in the blocks are Accuquilt dies. If you use that system, cutting out these shapes is super fast. The pattern is available from my website. It provides instructions for two quilts: the cover quilt with its glorious center medallion and an album-style quilt made solely from appliqué album blocks without the center medallion. It’s one of my most popular patterns. (51” x 51”).

Not only is this a fun quilt, but the title, of course, comes from the tales of 1001 Arabian Nights as told by one of the most amazing heroines in literature, Scheherazade (read more). She may perhaps been the first to create a “soap opera” narrative, but certainly she was the queen of cliffhangers...as she ultimately spared the lives of many young ladies who otherwise would have been beheaded. 

Get the pattern here. Only $14.98.

Photos of the Week - Week 2

Critique Group Challenge: 

Week 2, Levitation

Photo by Bruce Hinde

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Bruce says:

Short Stack Magic
I've been planning this shot all week (and I get to eat the props).
Bottom two cakes are on the plate. The next three are suported on a steel rod up the middle on round pieces of carboard. The top cake is suspended from above. 

52-Week Photo Challenge Class
Week 2 - Two Rectangles

Week 52 Photo Challenge:

Week 2, Two Rectangles

Photo by Cary Coutant

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Cary says:

This is a tie on the railroad tracks near my home. I liked the textures and colors, and the stray leaf.

Smart Phone Photo Challenges
Week 2 - Abstract Automobile

Smart Phone Challenge:

Week 2, Abstract Automobile

Photo by Deb Story

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Deb says:

Dirty rim from my Honda. It’s only 7 degrees here in WNY right now. I usually like to take several shots to chose from…but not this time with it so cold outside! Edited in Prisma app with Thota Vaikuntam

Smart Phone Challenge:

Week 2, Abstract Automobile

Photo by Ricky Tims

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Ricky says:

We still have some Christmas lights sparkling outside and these were sparkling on a very dirty truck. I liked the overall composition of this but of course the colors made a bigger impact. There are minor adjustments in BeCasso

Critique Group Challenge:

Week 2, Year Word - Levitation

Photo by Ricky Tims
from the 2021 Critique Group

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Ricky says:

My neighbors Steve and his wife Allison came for lunch but didn't escape my need for a couple of models for my levitation vision. Their costumes are nothing but pieces of fabric draped around. Steve climbed up on the rock with a staff. I had hoped he would be able to stand on a step stool, but it was too precarious. For the shot he simply raised one foot off the ground high enough that it exposed the sky underneath. I created his "right" foot by copying the left, flipping horizontal, and rotating it a bit. This was shot in full sun so I had to do a lot of adjustments to create the lighting effects and drama. The blue sky was replaced by a shot I took during the Spring Fire which was then manipulated and also using a filter in Topaz. Creating lightning was new for me. I found a tutorial that worked fairly well. With the tripod locked down, I took three photos...One of Allison, one of Steve, and one without anyone. See the original photos here: https://rickytims.smugmug.com/2022-PhotoExtras/

Photos of the Week - Week 52

Critique Group Challenge: 

Week 1, Year Word

Photo by Angelia Peterson

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Angelia says:

Magical light was dancing around the valley tonight. We have had a week of straight rain and have almost recieved our whole months rain totals in the first week of the year. The sounds of tundra swans, canadian geese and one barred owl fill my ears as I snap the shutter. Play was my year word last year and I thouroughly loved it. So for the first time I'm going to repeat my year word... it was liberating. Wanting to make the scene look as cold as I felt I placed my lense ball on the hood of the white car I was driving. Guess what a round object does on a slanted hood... it rolls. I keep my ball wrapped in plastic wrap to help keep the fingerprints down. I snagged the plastic wrap, wadded it up, and it became my stop for the project. Happy accident: it added a little mysterious haze to the sky and mimicked snow instead of looking like a blatant car hood. I will happily Play and expland my mind keeping my shutter pointed ahead and ready. Hope you all have a marvelous 2022. 

52-Week Photo Challenge Class
Week 1 - Selective Focus

Week 52 Photo Challenge:

Week 1, Selective Focus

Photo by Anita Taylor

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This is the very first week for the newbies in my photography class. Their goal was to shoot manual, and to shoot a shallow depth of field, highlighting their main subject, and blurring the rest.

Anita says:

Just some coffee pods with fairy lights to give a festive look.

Smart Phone Photo Challenges
Week 1 - Year Word

Smart Phone Challenge:

Week 1, Year Word

Photo by Georgia Brown 

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Georgia says:

This is part of my family. It is my daughters wedding so some are new. Can you find the gay married couple, the cancer survivor, the doctor, the teacher, the fireman, the high functioning autistic? What they all have in common is love.

Smart Phone Challenge:

Week 1, Year Word - Miracles

Photo by Ricky Tims

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Ricky says:

To create the year word, miracle, on my smart phone I had to think of various subjects that I might be able to shoot without going into Photoshop and doing something fancy. It dawned on me, that it is a miracle that I often live above the clouds. My head is not in the clouds, ha ha, but I do find it a miracle that I can look down and see the vastness of the world below. I claim miracles for this year and hope that many of you will find them too 

Critique Group Challenge:

Week 1, Year Word - Miracles

Photo by Ricky Tims
from the 2021 Critique Group

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Ricky says:

My topic gave me fits, even though it's what I'm claiming for 2022. I needed/wanted to make sure my image felt like a miracle. I thought about my lens ball and so I took a photo of me holding it. That photo is very drab, but with some fancy photoshop footwork I incorproated color - aspen leaves, and a little paper mache star. I'm not sure this expresses a miracle, but it feels magical and when I look to the future... I see miracles where few have been in the past few years

Mirkwood, a small oak forest at Ricky's home (Autumn Rock)

Mirkwood by Ricky Tims

On my land, next to my house, there is a small forest of oak trees that I named Mirkwood after the forest in The Hobbit by JRR Tolkein. Mirkwood is a magical place and I have made several quilts using those trees as a theme. The wildfire in 2018 went through Mirkwood, burned the undergrowth, singed all of the trees, and was hot enough that several of the trees did not survive...but most are recovering.

The background for this quilt was dye painted on a single piece of fabric with a color wash to create the general color of the sky, foliage, and foreground in Autumn. I also painted little gray sticks to become trunks of the trees and then painted black bars to represent the fence. On top of the dyed piece I used a confetti type applique' to enhance the fall leaves. The fence posts are created with fabric strips placed on top of the dyed bars. The dye bleeds a bit behind the bars and softens the effect. The random, large-stitch, machine quilting stitching secures the confetti appliqué and by using free motion stitching with black thread I was able to create detail in the aspen trunks as well as to create the wire on the fencing.

This is the only quilt I have made that I had framed and put behind glass. It just seemed appropriate for some reason.